Fire Safety

Some of the local fire department members stopped by school today to talk FIRE SAFETY.

Does your dwelling have working smoke detectors?  Have you checked them lately?
Does your family have a escape plan?  Do you practice the plan with your child?  Stay Safe!

Flashlight Friday is Back!

Friday was dull, gray and rainy.  That kind of day calls for reading in the dark with flashlights.  We pull the blinds down, turn off the lights and tuck ourselves into a spot somewhere in the classroom.  Then we spend a few minutes escaping in books!

The Golden Goose

We are fortunate enough to have the Merry-Go-Round Theatre from Auburn, NY visit us in the fall and spring.  Last week, we watched a performance of The Golden Goose (a Brothers Grimm tale).  The play brought humor, excitement and audience participation.

Working Away on a Typical School Day!

Lighthouse Meeting

Just about every month, the K-2 students get together around the lighthouse that is painted on the floor in the gymnasium.  We talk about being bucket fillers and making smart choices.  

A small amount of time at the end of each meeting is reserved for recognizing a student in each class who has shown bucket filling.  Here is our first recipient:

He is the one front and center...proud as a peacock!

Center Time!

We are slowly (but surely) working towards being independent learners during ELA and math centers.  Once we have our centers GRAND OPENING (hopefully in about two weeks), students will be involved in the following rotations:

ELA
Word Work (sight words and phonics)
Work on Writing
Read-to-Self
Read-to-Someone
Listening to Reading
Ipad
Teacher Table

Math
Math by Myself
Math with a Partner
Math Fluency
Teacher Table

On Friday, we learned the procedures for Read-to-Someone and took some time to give it a go.  It was quite successful!

We also spend time last week learning what it looks like and sounds like to play games with a partner during math.  We LOVE games with dice and cards.  The students practiced with the card game "More" (known to many of you as "War") and a dice game called "Cover Up".

The other blog pages!

Don't forget to check out the "What's Happening" and "Upcoming Dates" pages of the blog.  You can access this pages by clicking the tabs at the top of the blog.

A post with a whole lot of pictures!

The beginning of a new school year is reserved for getting to know each other better and learning the expectations, routines and procedures of the classroom.  We have been spending lots of time practicing, practicing and practicing following directions and thinking about the expectations.  We wanted to share some of the language and visuals that are being used in the classroom.  These may provide a starting point for conversation with your child!

We Know.  We Do.  We Feel.
Here is our school mission or pledge:

We recite this mission during announcements each morning.  The words "know", "do" and "feel" are also incorporated when talking with students about choices they are making (i.e. What do you know about listening?  What do you do when you listen?  How do you feel when you listen).

Check out Hoot the Wise Owl...

Hoot reminds us that rules are important--rules tell us what we need to do so we can be the best we can be!  The rules in our classroom are quite simple: Be Safe.  Be Respectful.  Be a Problem Solver.  We reflect on this words frequently.  Students work to make smart choices with these rules in mind.

We may earn a brownie point when we make really smart choices by following directions the first time!  This is a whole class effort!  As you can see, we have already earned three!  Once the cookie tray is full with ten brownie points, the class votes on a special reward.

We usually use call and response chants to get the attention of the class.  It may sound something like this, "I say hip, you say hop...hip...hop, hip...hop.  I say hocus, you say pocus...hocus...pocus, hocus...pocus.  I say ALL SET, you say YOU BET...ALL SET...YOU BET."  The students are working very hard to stop, drop everything, look and listen when the last part of the chant is said. 

We also spend a good amount of time practicing lining up and walking in the halls.  The reminders are simple:

We have chatted about appropriate voice levels.  The yellow finger moves to give a visual reminder of what our voices should sound like.  

Lastly, we have practiced and practiced what it sounds like and looks like to show Whole Body Listening.  This is not always an easy task for first graders, but it is certainly a necessary one!

It is our hope that the extra time and effort spent learning and practicing these routines, procedures and expectations at the beginning of the year will allow us to be the best learners we can be to succeed!

  

Let's get this little classroom blog dusted off...

and back up running!

Health and Fitness Day!

Last week we celebrated healthy living by visiting multiple stations throughout the day.

Our day started with a class cheer...1, 2, 3...Health and Fitness!

Then we were off to the opening show.  Mark Rothstein, jump rope guru, gave a high energy, entertaining show.  We all want to be jump rope masters now!

After the show we learned about bike safety.

 We also got our bodies moving a bit with karate, yoga and sports training sessions.

We visited with firefighters and learned about some emergency equipment they use.

We also participated in a healthy eating session with homemade strawberry juice to taste and homemade roasted red pepper hummus with celery and carrots!  Yum!  The students visited a bus and were reminded of safety and emergency procedures.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of these sessions!

Health and Fitness Day ended in the gymnasium with the gym roping competition.  We were able to show our support for many older siblings and our 4th grade buddies who were participating.

We had a blast!